New Delhi, Aug 29: The UK's University of Southampton has become the first foreign university to set up its offshore campus in India under the new NEP, the Centre announced on Thursday.

The University Grants Commission (UGC) had in 2023 announced Setting up and Operation of Campuses of Foreign Higher Educational Institutions in India Regulations.

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar handed over a Letter of Intent (LoI) to university representatives at an event here.

According to officials, the University of Southampton submitted a proposal for opening a branch campus in Gurugram that was approved by the UGC standing committee, comprising noted academics from India and abroad, for issuing a LoI as per regulations.

“The degrees awarded by the India campus of the University of Southampton will be the same as in the host university. The programmes offered in the branch campus of University of Southampton in India will have the same academic and quality standards,” UGC Chairman Jagadesh Kumar said.

“The Indian campus of the University of Southampton is expected to start its academic programmes in July 2025. The courses offered will be in subjects focusing on business and management, computing, law, engineering, art and design, biosciences and life sciences,” he added.

Australia's Deakin University and the University of Wollongong have already set up campuses in GIFT City in Gujarat. However, the University of Southampton will be the first foreign university to set up an India campus under UGC norms.

The University of Southampton is a founding member of the leading research-intensive Russell Group of universities in the UK.

External Affairs Minister Jaishankar said the development reflected both the vision of elevating India's educational standards to the highest global levels and delivering on the education pillar of India-UK cooperation.

“Confident that such endeavours will further make our youth work ready and foster a spirit of global understanding and cooperation,” he stated.

The minister highlighted the initiative would help establish a strong interactional footprint of brand India in the educational sphere.

“This is a growing reality as new technologies and service demands are sought to be harmonised with demographic deficits,” Jaishankar said.

Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan termed the development as a foot forward towards realising the goal of “internationalisation at home”, as envisioned in the National Education Policy (NEP), 2020.